18 Budaka pupils eat rat poison mistaking it for glucose

Eighteen pupils of Namirembe Boarding primary school in the eastern district of Budaka were admitted to Budaka health center after eating rat poison mistaking it for glucose.

According to the deputy head teacher, Robert Mukasa, a P2 pupil Cryspus Looki on Tuesday carried the rat poison from his grandmother's home.

This boy stays with his grandmother who had bought powdered poison to kill the rats in the house but placed it within reach of children. In the morning the boy placed the box of poison in his bag and went to school while the grandmother was still asleep, Mukasa said.

During break time the boy got out his box and started licking it and his classmates begged him for some and he shared it with 17 of his classmates," he said.

The number would have been bigger than that but what saved others was one boy who saw the box had a label with pictures of rats and informed the teachers that his friends had eaten poison, Mukasa said.

He said that shock gripped the school and teachers called an assembly to identify those who had eaten the rat poison and took them to the school clinic where they were given anti-poison charcoal tablets as first aid.

He said that the pupils who ate the poison were in the six to eight age bracket, adding that all were P2 pupils.

Eighteen pupils of Namirembe Boarding primary school in the eastern district of Budaka were admitted to Budaka health center after eating rat poison mistaking it for glucose.

According to the deputy head teacher, Robert Mukasa, a P2 pupil Cryspus Looki on Tuesday carried the rat poison from his grandmother's home.

This boy stays with his grandmother who had bought powdered poison to kill the rats in the house but placed it within reach of children. In the morning the boy placed the box of poison in his bag and went to school while the grandmother was still asleep, Mukasa said.

During break time the boy got out his box and started licking it and his classmates begged him for some and he shared it with 17 of his classmates," he said.

The number would have been bigger than that but what saved others was one boy who saw the box had a label with pictures of rats and informed the teachers that his friends had eaten poison, Mukasa said.

He said that shock gripped the school and teachers called an assembly to identify those who had eaten the rat poison and took them to the school clinic where they were given anti-poison charcoal tablets as first aid.

He said that the pupils who ate the poison were in the six to eight age bracket, adding that all were P2 pupils.